On the Road to the Whale Lagoons
Soft pastels of first light over calm La Paz Bay greeted us as we began our grand adventures today. The relaxed friendliness of this lovely city and the generous people that accommodated us during our abrupt change of plans is a breath of fresh air from our stateside world of schedules and feeling harried.
Crossing the fascinating Sonoran desert landscape filled with large columnar cacti and a variety of specialized shrubs gives us a wonderful sense of the vast expanse of uninhabited wild land that makes up most of the Baja California peninsula. This has been a year of good rains and the landscape is wonderfully green. In some places there are carpets of ephemeral wildflowers, a special event that happens only in the wettest years.
In Lopez Mateos, we are greeted warmly by our friends at the Ballena Gris (gray whale) restaurant and enjoy a sumptuous lunch of local lobster and freshly caught fish. At the nearby festive whale watch dock, the local pangeros are waiting to assist us into lifejackets and we quickly board our pangas and head out into the lagoon. Several mother California gray whales are here nursing their newborn calves. For thousands of years, these forty ton baleen whales have migrated many thousands of miles to this remote and protected place to bear their young. We too, have traveled thousands of miles to observe them here in their birthing and mating place.
Following a grand day of discovery, we rejoin the National Geographic Sea Lion this evening in San Carlos.
Soft pastels of first light over calm La Paz Bay greeted us as we began our grand adventures today. The relaxed friendliness of this lovely city and the generous people that accommodated us during our abrupt change of plans is a breath of fresh air from our stateside world of schedules and feeling harried.
Crossing the fascinating Sonoran desert landscape filled with large columnar cacti and a variety of specialized shrubs gives us a wonderful sense of the vast expanse of uninhabited wild land that makes up most of the Baja California peninsula. This has been a year of good rains and the landscape is wonderfully green. In some places there are carpets of ephemeral wildflowers, a special event that happens only in the wettest years.
In Lopez Mateos, we are greeted warmly by our friends at the Ballena Gris (gray whale) restaurant and enjoy a sumptuous lunch of local lobster and freshly caught fish. At the nearby festive whale watch dock, the local pangeros are waiting to assist us into lifejackets and we quickly board our pangas and head out into the lagoon. Several mother California gray whales are here nursing their newborn calves. For thousands of years, these forty ton baleen whales have migrated many thousands of miles to this remote and protected place to bear their young. We too, have traveled thousands of miles to observe them here in their birthing and mating place.
Following a grand day of discovery, we rejoin the National Geographic Sea Lion this evening in San Carlos.
